Streams of visitors from around the world continue to throng the Shanghai World Expo, bringing more demands in financial services for foreigners like foreign exchanges and foreign card acquiring. As the commercial bank with the most number of outlets in Shanghai, ICBC also witnesses rapid growth in foreign financial services. From the opening of Shanghai World Expo on May 1 to the end of June, figures show that ICBC's turnover of foreign exchanges in Shanghai rose more than 22% year-on-year to USD 676 million. Turnover of foreign card acquiring also registered 54% year-on-year growth to USD 680 million.

Worthy of note, ICBC financial services for foreigners during the World Expo withstand the test. ICBC wins enormous applause from foreign customers. According to the ICBC spokesperson of the Shanghai Branch, ICBC drew up numerous service measures to best serve the foreign customers during the World Expo and received good results.

I. "Zero distance" smile. Smile is a universal language. A smile can shorten the gap between ICBC and foreign customers who can feel the friendly smile and warm greeting once they walk into the ICBC outlets.

II. "Zero barrier" language. The top priority to ensure the quality of service for foreign customers is to understand their needs in the first instance. All ICBC key World Expo outlets have English-speaking service and are capable to handle complex FX services. ICBC assigns English-speaking staffs besides opening green channel for World Expo services and offering unique services. A team of volunteers well-versed in 8 minor languages picked from the ICBC branches is specially trained to assist foreign visitors coming to ICBC at ease without communication barrier. Meanwhile, ICBC 95588 Telephone Banking in Shanghai provides services in minor languages. Multi-lingual services apart from English including German, Japanese, Korean, French, Spanish, Arabic, Russian and Portuguese are offered.

III. "Zero failure" devices. Foreign customers are used to banking at ATM. Therefore, it is crucial to offer 24-hour service during the World Expo. ICBC arranges special management and maintenance to ensure the non-stop running of the self-service devices. Dedicated staffs are assigned to monitor the ATM and increasing the times of loading cash into ATM.

IV. Foreign currency "Exchange Anytime". At present, 106 key ICBC World Expo outlets accept 10 foreign currencies (including New Taiwan dollars) in their foreign currency exchange services and traveler's cheque. The outlets have sufficient stock to cater for the foreign currency exchanges by the visitors from around the world.